Baraqel remained silent for several moments, then a cockerel let out a raucous hallelujah to the morning close by, and I decided my angel had taken his leave.

“Dark travellers on the road. Born of flame. A prince has sent them. A prince of evil, of darkness and revenge, a prince of lightning. A thorn prince. They are his work. Messengers of the doom to come.”

The pronouncement startled me awake again. “That’s the sort of nonsense I could have off Dr. Taproot’s old fortune-teller for half a copper.” More yawning, more scratching. “What prince? What doom?”

“The thorn prince. He whose line will spill heaven into hell and rip the world asunder. His gift is the death of angels, the death of . . .” And blessedly he trailed off, the sun having cleared the horizon somewhere out beyond the musty confines of my room.

I stretched, yawned, scratched, contemplated the end of all things, and went back to sleep.

We left the inn after a breakfast of liver and fried potatoes washed down with small beer. So far the famed cuisine of Ancrath had proved the least appealing aspect of the country, but riding a horse day in, day out for weeks on end gives a man an appetite of the kind that’s ready to try anything. Even horse.

Joining the Roma Road once more from the dirt track to the inn, I fell into my customary daydreaming, the sort that’s apt to get you killed in the wilds but is the kind of luxury civilization affords us. I realized simultaneously that I had no idea what a liver was for and that I also didn’t ever want to eat one again, especially not for breakfast with garlic.

Snorri stopped me pursuing that line of thought any further by drawing up in the road directly ahead of me. A ragged group of travellers were heading north towards Crath City, blocking the road, some pulling handcarts, others labouring under their possessions, others still flapping along in just the tatters they wore. And amongst them not a clean limb showed: All were black with filth of some kind.

“Refugees,” Snorri said.

Dark travellers. An echo of Baraqel’s prophecy ran through my mind.

As we caught them up I saw many bore wounds, still raw and open, and each of them—man, woman, child—was black with soot, or with dried mud, or black with both. Snorri nudged Sleipnir in amongst them, offering apologies. I followed, trying not to let any of them touch me.

“What happened here, friend?” Snorri leaned from his saddle towards a tall fellow, peasant-thin, an ugly rip along the top of his scalp.

The man offered a blank-eyed stare. “Raiders.” Little more than a mutter.

“Where away?” Snorri asked, but the man had turned from him.

“Norwood.” A woman on the other side, grey-haired and hobbling. “They burned it down. There’s nothing for us now.”

“Baron Ken’s troops? Is Ancrath at war?” Snorri frowned.

The woman shook her head and spat. “Raiders. Renar men. Everywhere’s burning. Sometimes it’s knights and soldiers, sometimes just rabble. Road scum.” She turned away, head down, lost in her misery.